A conventional data storage system includes a primary data storage array and a physical backup appliance. These conventional physical data storage components operate to manage host data on behalf of host computers.
During operation, the primary data storage array responds to host input/output (I/O) requests from the host computers by writing host data to and reading host data from a group of storage devices of the array. Furthermore, the physical backup appliance maintains a backup copy of the host data.
If the host data on the group of storage devices of the array is lost, the host data may be recovered via the physical backup appliance. For example, suppose that the group of storage devices suffers multiple storage device failures resulting in loss of host data. In such a situation, the backed up host data may be restored by the physical backup appliance to another group of storage devices of the array.